Medium · published January 11, 2025
In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved:
arm64: ptrace: fix partial SETREGSET for NT_ARM_POE
Currently poe_set() doesn't initialize the temporary 'ctrl' variable,
and a SETREGSET call with a length of zero will leave this
uninitialized. Consequently an arbitrary value will be written back to
target->thread.por_el0, potentially leaking up to 64 bits of memory from
the kernel stack. The read is limited to a specific slot on the stack,
and the issue does not provide a write mechanism.
Fix this by initializing the temporary value before copying the regset
from userspace, as for other regsets (e.g. NT_PRSTATUS, NT_PRFPREG,
NT_ARM_SYSTEM_CALL). In the case of a zero-length write, the existing
contents of POR_EL1 will be retained.
Before this patch:
| # ./poe-test
| Attempting to write NT_ARM_POE::por_el0 = 0x900d900d900d900d
| SETREGSET(nt=0x40f, len=8) wrote 8 bytes
|
| Attempting to read NT_ARM_POE::por_el0
| GETREGSET(nt=0x40f, len=8) read 8 bytes
| Read NT_ARM_POE::por_el0 = 0x900d900d900d900d
|
| Attempting to write NT_ARM_POE (zero length)
| SETREGSET(nt=0x40f, len=0) wrote 0 bytes
|
| Attempting to read NT_ARM_POE::por_el0
| GETREGSET(nt=0x40f, len=8) read 8 bytes
| Read NT_ARM_POE::por_el0 = 0xffff8000839c3d50
After this patch:
| # ./poe-test
| Attempting to write NT_ARM_POE::por_el0 = 0x900d900d900d900d
| SETREGSET(nt=0x40f, len=8) wrote 8 bytes
|
| Attempting to read NT_ARM_POE::por_el0
| GETREGSET(nt=0x40f, len=8) read 8 bytes
| Read NT_ARM_POE::por_el0 = 0x900d900d900d900d
|
| Attempting to write NT_ARM_POE (zero length)
| SETREGSET(nt=0x40f, len=0) wrote 0 bytes
|
| Attempting to read NT_ARM_POE::por_el0
| GETREGSET(nt=0x40f, len=8) read 8 bytes
| Read NT_ARM_POE::por_el0 = 0x900d900d900d900d